Gary Simmons

Simon Lee Gallery is pleased to announce its second solo exhibition of the renowned American artist Gary Simmons. For Gary Simmons, the act of erasure has been a central theme in his work throughout his career. Referencing film, architecture, and white American popular culture, his new “erasure” drawings move away from the use of paint and canvas, and revert back to pastel and chalk on black or white paper, which is where his practice began. Inspired by Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film The Shining, Simmons uses the iconic imagery of the Overlook Hotel for one of his new drawings, whose imposing architecture takes on a haunting personality of its own. The image also incorporates the structure of The Bryce Hospital in Alabama – an institution to house African Americans deemed “insane” in the early 20th Century. This alludes to the root of the inspiration of this new body of work: haunted...